


the first who ever did

by finalizer



Series: not if it's you [1]
Category: Villains Series - V. E. Schwab
Genre: First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, M/M, look.. i have feelings okay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-27
Updated: 2019-08-27
Packaged: 2020-10-04 16:21:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20473970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/finalizer/pseuds/finalizer
Summary: It was minutes past eleven, the sky was pitch black, and Mitch was pouring Victor a drink.





	the first who ever did

**Author's Note:**

> kinda funny how it only took a week for me to hand over my wholeass entire soul to these books

It was minutes past eleven, the sky was pitch black, and Mitch was pouring Victor a drink.

Sydney had gone to bed with little complaint. She often liked to put up a fight, test her own limits and Victor’s dwindling patience, but in the end her eyes always drooped. Sometimes she scampered off to her room on her own. Other times she had to be carried, having fallen asleep on the couch, on the floor, or on one momentous occasion, with her head cradled in her arms at the dining room table, half in her unfinished plate.

The two of them now sat across from each other, only feet apart. Mitch was slouched back on the couch, head against the cushions, legs sprawled out in front of him. Victor had claimed the armchair facing him. He was leaning forward—taut, wound up, as he always was these days—elbows on his knees, drink in his hand. The skyline beyond the windows was peppered with lights from hundreds of other buildings, the city below them alive. 

The whiskey in the bottle on the kitchen counter steadily vanished as sorrows were drowned. 

Things weren't looking up. Victor kept dying—it was happening multiple times a week now. They were running out of options.

He looked gaunt, he looked _terrible_, and Mitch couldn’t do much more than offer his expertise, uneasy attempts at emotional support, or a second refill of liquor, followed by a third.

He could talk, too, and get Victor talking, to get his mind off everything that was at stake.

It was boring conversation at first, bland questions, inane comments, that soon made way for slightly more interesting topics—their pasts, the people in their lives, stupid things they’d done, the places they’d been. 

The alcohol was hot and sluggish in Mitch’s veins, but he felt wide awake. He watched as Victor grinned, real and unrestrained, at whatever it was Mitch had just said; he didn't remember what it’d been, the words disappeared from his mind the moment they left his throat, the moment Victor had laughed. All he could focus on was the line of Victor’s jaw, the barely-there humored glint in his cruel, blue eyes.

It was beautiful, a split second moment in time where Victor was completely present in the moment, where his mind wasn’t wandering off to wretched, darker thoughts.

And it made Mitch curious. He wanted to know if there was anything that really got Victor to relax and unwind, to exhale, close his eyes, just _breathe_.

They were both toeing the line between tipsy and slightly more than tipsy. Mitch’s mouth formed the question before his brain even caught up with it.

“When’s the last time you really let go?”

Victor lowered his glass from his lips and frowned.

“You know—went out, got drunk, let loose, kissed someone, that sort of thing.”

Mitch stopped himself before he rambled his way into a sticky situation. He considered the sudden rigidity that’d returned to Victor’s shoulders. It didn't bode well.

He followed up with a lighthearted, “Or is that not your scene in the slightest?” before Victor could curl in on himself and throw his walls back up.

But Victor’s expression darkened; he didn't seem insulted by the question, rather like he was painfully reminded of something he would prefer not to think about if he could avoid it.

Mitch was on the verge of taking it all back and frantically changing the subject when Victor answered. 

“Eli.”

He said it in a voice so quiet Mitch wasn't sure he’d said it at all.

“Come again?”

“Sophomore year at Lockland. There was an early New Year’s Eve party and we were drunk; I mean, absolutely shitfaced. He kissed me. We never really talked about it after that. It hadn't meant anything.”

Mitch found himself falling impossibly still.

It was so unlike Victor to divulge details, even more so without being prompted. But his fingers were loose around his glass and his lips loose around the words. There was a pinkish blush to his cheeks from the alcohol, but his eyes were sharp and clear. A frown creased the space between his brows. He was evidently recalling the details of said encounter, and he didn’t seem to like that at all.

“That’s rough,” Mitch said lamely. 

He wasn’t great at offering comfort. He didn't do well with being put on the spot.

And Victor in turn, wasn’t great at accepting sympathy. Sympathy equalled pity, and pity equalled weakness. He was stubborn like that.

Hesitantly, Mitch asked, “No one since then?”

The idea was to drag Victor out of his thoughts. That, and Mitch couldn’t stop himself from barreling down that singular, accursed path, the thought of Victor kissing someone.

“No. I don’t—” Victor’s brows knit together as he paused. “It’s not really a priority. Or, never was. Prison sort of puts a damper on the whole romance thing, don't you think?”

The answer sounded like an evasion.

Mitch respected the distance between them. Victor had his secrets. There were things Mitch didn’t know. There were also some things that he _did_ know, that Victor had never outright told him. It was more of a feeling, an instinct. But Mitch never brought any of it up. He knew Victor would tell him when he was ready, if ever.

“Must be a shitty memory.”

Victor shrugged. It was more of an erratic jerk, like his body had done it without his explicit permission.

It burrowed into Mitch’s gut like a parasite, watching Victor hurt all the time. Worse yet, was that Victor tried to hide it from everyone around him. He never let anyone see whatever it was twisting his insides. He fought on his own.

But Mitch could always tell. He’d learned to read between the lines of Victor’s face.

“Come here.”

Victor’s gaze flicked up and he eyed Mitch curiously. 

“I don’t bite, Vic.”

A languid smile swept onto Victor’s face then, his lips twitching up. But his eyes remained frigid, distant. The dark circles were getting worse. 

Finally, when Victor made no move to rise from his armchair, Mitch sighed and heaved himself up.

He set his drink down precariously on the couch cushion he’d vacated and crossed over to Victor in two short strides. 

Victor looked up at him. The fingers around his glass were suddenly white with the pressure of holding it steady. His jaw was set, his breathing shallow. Visibly, his gears turned as he tried to deduce Mitch’s intentions. He didn't seem to have much luck coming up with an answer.

Mitch sank down in a crouch, now nearly at eye level with Victor, who was still perched at the edge of his seat. 

Victor watched him carefully. He wasn't nervous. Hesitant, confused maybe, but he trusted Mitch enough to go ahead with whatever he meant to do.

Mitch moved before he could talk himself out of it. 

His hand rose to Victor’s face, ghosting over the faint flush of his cheekbones, across his brow bone, pushing a strand of that startlingly pale hair away from his forehead. 

“Tell me if you want me to stop.”

“Mitch—” 

It was hardly above a whisper. There was an edge to his voice that Mitch couldn’t quite place.

“I don’t—I’m not—” 

It was apparent that Victor himself did not know what he was trying to say just then.

“I know,” Mitch told him anyway. “Just say the word and I’ll stop.”

His hand lingered, painfully gentle, barely grazing Victor’s skin. He braced his other hand against Victor’s knee so that he wouldn’t lose balance and fall forward.

The glass in Victor’s hands was on the verge of shattering. 

Victor took a deep breath and looked at Mitch, over every inch of his face. He looked lost, overwhelmed. 

When he spoke again, his voice was somehow, impossibly even quieter than before. 

“Don’t stop,” he finally said, like he was pleading, like it was a prayer.

Mitch’s hand trailed over Victor’s hair, as if to tuck it behind his ear, and settled at the back of his neck. He kept his movements slow, gentle, careful, desperate not to spook him.

Victor’s exhale was shaky. His eyes fluttered closed.

Mitch leaned in and pressed his lips against Victor’s. 

It was chaste, unbearably short. It lasted all of a second but felt like a lifetime.

Mitch pulled away and inched back, stayed just close enough to still feel Victor’s breath against his skin. 

Victor swallowed. His entire body seemed to tremble. He looked at Mitch, blinked, eyes searching his face for something, _something_. The roar of his pulse was audible, almost, over the frantic racing of Mitch’s own.

A second passed, then another, and Victor freed one hand from around his glass, settled his palm on Mitch’s chest, right over his heart. His fingers twitched against Mitch’s shirt like he was debating tugging him forward. It was an invitation. 

Mitch didn't hesitate to close the distance between them.

Victor _melted_. He gasped against Mitch’s mouth, parted his lips and _surrendered_. The tension dropped from his shoulders and a muffled sound tore from his throat when Mitch’s hand came back up to frame his jaw, tilt his head back and keep him close, so close.

Mitch kissed him with reverence; he wasn't entirely sure if this was real, if it was actually happening. He didn't know if Victor was something he was allowed to touch. He was so distant, absent, chiseled from stone, no flesh, no bone beneath his alabaster skin.

It was absurd, how long Mitch had thought about this very moment, about what it would be like to kiss Victor Vale. It was absurd that it could be a reality. He was sure of it like he’d never been sure of anything before, that he never wanted this to stop.

Victor was pliant against him. The hesitation had faded from him, replaced by something firmer, something heated, more certain. He was pushing forward, giving as good as he got.

It felt like decades before they parted. Mitch’s trembling palms were cupped around Victor’s face, Victor’s fingers curled into the front of Mitch’s shirt in a vice grip.

There was a rare rush of color in Victor’s face, in his cheeks, his reddened lips. It was stunning. Mitch’s heart lurched. 

He dropped his hands to Victor’s knees and rolled back on the balls of his feet. Just far enough, just in case, he wanted to give Victor space.

Victor, who was utterly breathless. He looked dizzy. Wary, too, unsure of what had happened, yet all at once content. _Pleased_. Properly distracted.

The lines around his eyes had smoothed out just enough for the difference to be perceptible. The corners of his lips twisted in an almost-smile as he struggled to even his breathing. He looked _alive_, for the first time in ages. 

His hand dropped from Mitch’s shirt and down to his knees. He covered Mitch’s hand with his own, the glass of whiskey in the other tipping precariously.

Mitch smiled, a little bit crooked, so wide, so genuine it ached. 

“Let’s hope this one’s a better memory.”

**Author's Note:**

> scream with me: [twitter](http://www.twitter.com/finaIizer) & [tumblr](https://tarmairons.tumblr.com)
> 
> title from cinnamon girl by lana del rey  
_(...) if you hold me without hurting me_  
_you'll be the first who ever did_


End file.
